


Poster Paper, Yellowed at the Edges

by Lywinis



Series: One Shots -- Capsicoul [1]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Capsicoul - Freeform, Getting Together, M/M, Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-22
Updated: 2013-02-22
Packaged: 2017-12-03 06:07:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 640
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/695049
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lywinis/pseuds/Lywinis
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>His first kiss was with the Captain.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Poster Paper, Yellowed at the Edges

His first kiss was with the Captain. Phil was almost ashamed to admit it to himself, even though the memory is there, his chapped lips pressing against the coolness of the poster paper in the dim morning light of his room. He was sixteen, young and stupid, and he’d done it without ever realizing why. It burned in him, this secret shame, when he blurts out that he watched the man sleeping, because what he really wants to tell the man is that “I’ve been waiting for you for so long.”

The Captain looked nonplussed, and Phil goes to gnaw his own arm off, his face burning.

There were many kisses after that, long into his adulthood, but none could compare to the feeling of chapped lips against poster paper. It was detached, not the same. Men, women, each of his partners was different, chosen with the same care that Phil took with his ties in the morning. It was never a matter of finding and falling in love with someone. That had already happened, and nothing had come of it. You either found a partner, or you were looked at as abnormal, an anomaly. Phil struggled with normal, clutched it to his chest.

Poster paper, smooth and glossy, and it echoed in the back of his head that he would never get exactly what he wanted.

He came to terms with it, building relationships like one would an office building, neat, compact, compartmentalized. Nothing bled into the other, nothing touched the core of who he was. Nothing leaked into every facet of his life, nothing swept him along and carried him when his feet dragged, kept him awake on the battlefield when he was wounded and going into shock. It was the way it needed to be, because nothing could compare with what he wanted.

He was just Phil, and the Captain became Steve, and then he was in the hospital, his chest in a binding bandage and his breathing a rasp in his chest. He’d woken with his hand warm and clammy, looking over to find Steve’s grip in his own, the blonde head tucked into a broad arm as he slept. Phil squeezed, and the Captain woke, groggy blue eyes lighting with pleasure as he found Phil awake and aware.

It was good, being friends. Not perfect, but better than the crippling embarrassment of “I watched you while you were sleeping”, infinitely better than chapped lips against poster paper and the longing of childhood.

His second kiss with the Captain was unexpected, and Phil realized that was for the best. So much of his life had gone planned, compartmentalized, that inner part of him still asking when it was his turn.

Steve pinned him to the wall of the helicarrier’s locker room, mouth hot over his, lips soft and slanting, hands gripping his hips. Phil’s eyes widened, then closed, a reedy noise coming from his mouth that spoke of poor self-control – but it was him, how could he have poor self-control? Steve’s eyes closed, and he shuddered, a sigh, pulling back and looking at Phil.

“I’ve wanted to do that,” he said. Phil’s eyebrows rose.

“You have?”

“For a long time,” he said, his mouth quirking into a grin. “That was…that was my second kiss.”

Phil’s mouth rose into a smile in response. “Mine, too. The second one that mattered, anyway.”

“Oh?” Steve’s eyebrows knit. “Who was your first?”

_You._

“It doesn’t matter now,” Phil said, wrapping his hand in the mail of Steve’s uniform, pulling him down for another kiss, this one slow and sweet, full of aching heat. He was gratified when Steve shuddered against him, and he pushed the other against the wall, taking his time. He’d waited almost his whole life, after all.

It didn’t matter now. Poster paper didn’t kiss back.

**Author's Note:**

> Another one I flash ficc'ed for Orb01. It always seems to keep happening that she draws something adorable and I slap down something like this for it -- with permission of course. I did one more that I'll be posting here shortly, and then I need to start writing again so I can have more stuff to show you guys. Thanks for reading!
> 
> \-- Lywinis


End file.
